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Matias Piñeiro 29/10 > 30/11/2017

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“My films are not realistic or naturalistic. They’re awkward, and I like that.You cannot do sociology with them. They are constructions. I do share a time and place with these people. We belong to the middle class. We’re trying to work things out through art. We even live in a bubble. But I’m not trying to say ‘This is how young people in Argentina are today.’”

With his elegant and chatty chamber pieces, Argentinian writer-director Matias Piñeiro seems to have established himself firmly in the tradition of Eric Rohmer and Jacques Rivette. Ever since his debut film, El Hombre robado (2007), Piñeiro’s characters are almost invariably young middle-class bohemians, whose everyday lives are occupied with sentimental intrigues and lively conversations on art, love and friendship. Made with modest means and with the help of an intimate group of actors and collaborators, Piñeiro’s game of variations comes into full play in his so-called “Shakespeareads,” a series of modern-day stories inspired by the female roles of Shakespeare’s comedies. Piñeiro’s liberal riffing on the playwright’s work began in 2010 with Rosalinda and continues with his latest film Hermia & Helena (2017), which is the first film that the filmmaker shot outside his native Argentina, prompted by his real-life relocation to New York. The precise gestures, sharp dialogues and youthful energies that make all of Piñeiro’s work so compelling are in full bloom in this delightful constellation of shifting relationships, filled with amorous encounters, dead ends and new beginnings.

A retrospective and carte blanche, organized by Cinematek and Courtisane, in collaboration with Le Jeu de Paume, Cinea, Research Center for Visual Poetics of the University of Antwerp & the Embassy of Argentina in Belgium.

Matias Piñeiro will be present to discuss his work on 4, 5 and 6 November. On 6 November 10h a symposium on his work will be held at Cinematek, organized by Cinea in cooperation with the Research Center for Visual Poetics of the University of Antwerp.